Britain comes third in e-government rankings

The UK has been ranked third in a global chart measuring the readiness of its e-government strategy, according to a report published by the United Nations (UN) this week.

The UN Global E-government Readiness Report 2004 ranking system compares countries' e-government readiness and their extent of e-government participation. It placed the US at the top of the table, followed by Denmark.

It was put together by United Nations Online Network in Public Administration and Finance (UNPAN), a division of the UN that details the public policies, administration and services of UN member states.

Although it does not provide any further information on individual countries, its website states that "governments have made rapid progress worldwide in embracing ICT technologies for e-government in the past years. In 2001, the UN e-government survey listed 143 member states as using the internet in some capacity; by 2004, 93 per cent or 178 out of 191 member states had a website presence."

It continues: "Broad trends of e-government development around the world in 2004 reaffirm that political ideology, economic and social systems; level of development; resource availability, human and technological infrastructure; institutional framework and cultural patterns all have a bearing on how, and how well, an e-government initiative is utilised."

Research found that between 85 per cent and 92 per cent of all countries now provide a number of government databases, laws, policies and other documents online. And more than 75 per cent of the 170 countries surveyed allow the downloading of documents online.

However, the number of countries providing public services online did not improve on a third from last year and progress in providing transactional services online appears to be limited to the more developed countries.